ESPN again showing the UK love

by:Thomas Beisner12/07/09
nyc-party-john-wall-dance Just under 75% of the internet is currently occupied by Kentucky and/or John Wall stories following the Cats' 1,996th all-time win on Saturday. The latest honor comes from the still missing Andy Katz (can I go back to making fun of him now, Matt?), who names UK their "Team of the Week" for doing what Louisville couldn't - beat all the Carolina schools on their schedule. Katz says that UK has another chance to make a weekly statement with UConn in The Garden and their "first real road test at Indiana"...which is going to be like a Final Exam in frisbee golf. Also, Katz's much taller and much smarter counterpart, Jay Bilas, gives some affectionate ego stroking to UK, John Wall and Patrick Patterson - his best player of the week. My favorite part of Bilas' piece, though, is this little blurb about being chastised for picking against certain schools (which he did this week against UK):
It is just part of the business, but it always makes me laugh when fans, coaches and players get all worked up when writers and talking heads predict a winner in a game. Kentucky coach John Calipari jokingly called out Seth Davis of CBS for picking North Carolina (as many of us did). Clearly it was on Cal's mind after a great performance by his young team. The truth is, none of us has any real certainty which team will win; we just have a belief. If we really knew, we would all go to Las Vegas and sit by the pool, filthy rich. People with a rooting interest get all hot and bothered when a pundit picks against their team, but nobody seems to mind when their team is picked and loses. My favorite response is from Bill Raftery, who always jokes with fans that get on him for his commentary by saying, "I must have missed all of your thank you notes!"
Live it up, folks. The tourist hot spots of New York City and Bloomington are up next. It's a great time to be a Wildcat.

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